It's said that a well-told story is remembered more accurately, and far longer than learning derived from facts and figures.  Unfortunately, I only have a handful of memories from the months I was completely lost on fentanyl patches.  After my double spinal fusion, I was sent home with boxes of "pain medicine" patches.  

No one in my family–including me–even realized I was on a high dose of fentanyl. Even if we did, we wouldn't have known the dangers of this deadly drug.  Now that I know the danger I put my family in, the memories from those months still hit me with a debilitating wave of grief & bring me to my knees in tears.  I was unable to change my own patches so that job was left to my mom & closest friend.  So many times my patches would fall off. My babies would crawl into bed & snuggle with me when I was unable to walk. They could have easily overdosed, just by touching the medicine on the patch. 

One of our dearest friend's son was given a fentanyl patch at a party and it took his life. 

Even the doctors have no clue how to safely wean you from this deadly drug.  I spent 30 days puking my guts out and wasting away on the couch as I weaned from Fentanyl by replacing it with a handful of opioids, Valium, and morphine.  Fentanyl is 50 times stronger than HEROIN.  Did you hear me? It is 100 times stronger than morphine.  Fentanyl is a death warrant, not a solution for pain! 

We can all be so forgetful.  We can all fail to remember the magnificence of love and mercy showered down on us.  I can choose to forget that I am alive today only by the grace of God or I can tell my story & pray those that read it are not as ignorant as I was when Fentanyl fell into my lap. 

Please help me share my story to help fight this heartbreaking epidemic that is stealing the lives of so many beautiful souls.